Busted play turns golden for VCU

When his team arrived here at the Alamodome for Friday night’s late Southwest Regional semifinal against Florida State, VCU coach Shaka Smart moseyed to press row.

There he watched a few minutes of Kansas’ demolition of Richmond and sat next to Tom Yeager, commissioner of VCU’s conference, the Colonial Athletic Association.

“Don’t be nervous,” Smart said to Yeager as he went to join his Rams in the locker room. “We’re gonna win.”

Nearly three hours later, with VCU trailing by one and 7.9 seconds remaining in overtime, Smart repeated the mantra to his players.

“We’re gonna win.”

A busted inbounds play and defensive stand later, the Rams proved their coach prophetic.

VCU 72, Florida State 71.

“Mayhem,” Rams power forward Jamie Skeen said of the final seven-plus minutes of regulation and the OT. “Mayhem.”

How 11th-seeded VCU (27-11) survived that mayhem to reach Sunday’s final against top-seeded Kansas will be relived on Broad Street for years (decades?) to come.

The victory puts the Rams, a team many said didn’t belong in the tournament, one step from the Final Four, one step from matching CAA colleague George Mason’s 2006 run.

Here’s how the last 7.9 seconds unfolded.

After FSU’s Bernard James swatted Joey Rodriguez’s layup out of bounds with 7.9 ticks left, VCU called timeout, and Smart set up the Rams’ favorite underneath inbounds play. When the teams returned to the court, the Seminoles called time, and Smart noticed one of their assistant coaches telling players what the Rams would run.

“They had it scouted,” Smart said. “It was a pretty easy decision to switch to something different.”

"Coach was calm, confident, cool and aggressive," reserve guard Rob Brandenberg said of the final huddle. "He knew we were going to get a good look at it. He told us we were going to win the game."

The new play, named simply “11,” called for Skeen and Brandon Rozzell to screen for one another. But they became entangled with FSU defenders, and Rozzell tripped.

Rodriguez was counting in his mind and knew the 5-second limit was about to elapse.

“I knew (we) didn’t have any timeouts,” he said. “I wasn’t about to do a Chris Webber.”

Rodriguez faked a long pass toward Brandenberg, and the motion caused FSU’s Deividas Dulkys, guarding the pass, to flinch. That’s when Bradford Burgess slipped wide open toward the basket, gathered Rodriguez’s pass and layed the ball in with 7.1 seconds left for the last of his game-high 26 points.

“It was a mistake on me,” FSU’s Derwin Kitchen said. “I was guarding Burgess and I turned my head the wrong way, and he slipped. … I thought we had somebody under.”

As he did at the end of regulation, when Kitchen failed to launch a shot in the waning seconds, FSU coach Leonard Hamilton disdained a timeout. Kitchen (team-high 23 points and 12 rebounds) raced upcourt, penetrated and kicked the ball back to Chris Singleton.

Seven inches shorter than the 6-foot-9 Singleton, Brandenberg blocked a shot that didn’t appear to beat the clock anyway.

“I wasn’t even thinking about a foul,” Brandenberg said. “I had to get the block or do something to distract him. Singleton’s a pro.”

Atrocious game management by FSU (23-11), ecstasy for VCU.

“Wow,” Rams reserve guard Darius Theus said, “just wow.”

“Tonight was the first game in the NCAA tournament, out of four for us, where we faced a significant amount of adversity,” Smart said. “So I was really proud of the way our guys battled and hung in there.”

The Rams’ adversity started when they led 62-53 with 7:37 remaining. Burgess was burying threes, Rozzell had shoehorned 14 of his 16 points into about five minutes, and VCU was dissecting the nation’s No. 1 field-goal percentage defense (36.0).

But the Rams scored only three more points in regulation. They missed 5-of-6 free throws and committed two shot-clock turnovers, and with 45 seconds left, Singleton’s right-wing 3-pointer forged a 65-all tie.

In the OT, Burgess’ sixth 3-pointer in seven attempts gave VCU a 68-67 lead, but after Rodriguez, an 80-percent free-throw shooter, clanged two, Singleton scored on a baseline drive to give the Seminoles a 71-70 lead and set up the final sequence.

But the story was Burgess, a junior from Richmond who matched his season-high in points, and who, in the last three games, has made 11-of-15 threes. This against defensive-minded opponents Georgetown, Purdue and Florida State.

“The scary thing is,” Smart said, “I think the best is yet to come for Brad.”

Now VCU heads to its first regional final. Is the best, still, yet to come?